GAZA: Gaza’s schools lie in ruins or have been turned into shelters for families displaced by a war that has killed tens of thousands. Yet teacher Israa Abu Mustafa refuses to let death and destruction deprive traumatized children of an education.
After a four-story building containing her home was demolished by an Israeli air strike, Abu Mustafa set up a classroom on the rubble under a tent.
Her impromptu school is one of the few remaining options for children in her neighborhood.
“During the war, we had to fill water gallons and collect sticks for firewood. Then Miss Israa found us and brought us here to continue learning,” said 10-year-old Hala Abu Mustafa.
The project began with 35 pupils and that number gradually increased to 70, ranging from pre-school to sixth graders aged 11-12.
Since the war began on Oct. 7, schools have been bombed or turned into shelters for displaced people, leaving Gaza’s estimated 625,000 school-aged children unable to attend classes.
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Education, at least 10,490 school and university students have been killed in the Israeli offensive. More than 500 school teachers and university educators have also been killed.
The conflict erupted when the Palestinian militant group Hamas attacked southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking over 250 people hostage, according to Israeli tallies. Israel responded with the military campaign in Gaza, killing more than 40,861 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities.
Israel says it goes to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties and accuses Hamas of using human shields and operating from schools, an allegation the group denies.
Abu Mustafa’s lessons go beyond just a curriculum. Her classes provide a sense of structure and routine in the chaos.
The tent is far from a traditional classroom where children once dreamed of one day studying abroad or becoming doctors and engineers who help the people of Gaza, which was impoverished and suffered from high unemployment long before the war erupted.
“We need chairs and tables so the children can learn properly instead of being forced to write on the ground,” the 29-year-old teacher said.
With limited resources, Abu Mustafa teaches basic lessons including religious studies, trying to keep her students engaged despite the relentless bombardment.
Gaza and the Israeli-occupied West Bank have internationally high literacy levels, and the under-resourced education system was a rare source of hope and pride among Palestinians.
“What could be the child’s wish? They have the right to learn in a safe environment, they have the right to play in safe place, to not feel any fear,” Abu Mustafa said.
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Gaza teacher offers ray of hope with classroom in rubble
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Gaza teacher offers ray of hope with classroom in rubble
- After a four-story building containing her home was demolished by an Israeli air strike, Abu Mustafa set up a classroom on the rubble under a tent
- Her classes provide a sense of structure and routine in the chaos
MSF says conditions for Gaza medics ‘as hard as it’s ever been’ despite truce
DOHA: Conditions for medics and patients in Gaza are as severe as ever despite a nearly two-month truce in the territory, the president of medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said in an AFP interview.
Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas agreed in October to a US-backed truce deal for Gaza which stipulated an influx of aid to the territory devastated by two years of war and in the grip of a humanitarian crisis.
“It’s as hard as it’s ever been,” Javid Abdelmoneim said of conditions for medical staff operating in Gaza’s hospitals, speaking on the sidelines of the annual Doha Forum on diplomacy on Sunday.
“While we’re able to continue doing operations, deliveries, wound care, you’re using protocols or materials and drugs that are inferior, that are not the standard. So you’ve got substandard care being delivered,” he explained.
Abdelmoneim, who worked as a doctor in Gaza in 2024, said the ongoing truce was only a “ceasefire of sorts” with “still several to dozens of Palestinians being killed every day by Israel.”
Despite the truce, 376 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to local health authorities, as well as three Israeli soldiers.
“We’re seeing the injured patients in the emergency rooms in which we work throughout the strip,” he added.
Aid agencies are pushing for more access for humanitarian convoys to enter Gaza while Israel has resisted calls to allow aid through the Rafah crossing from Egypt.
Aid ‘weaponized’
The MSF president said that since the truce began, aid “hasn’t come in to the level that’s necessary.”
“There isn’t a substantial change and it is being weaponized... So as far as we’re concerned that is an ongoing feature of the genocide. It’s being used as a chip and that’s something that should not happen with humanitarian aid,” Abdelmoneim said.
In 2024, MSF said its medical teams had witnessed evidence on the ground in Gaza and concluded that genocide was taking place.
Israel’s foreign ministry rejected the report saying at the time that it was “fabricated.”
Abdelmoneim said both the lack of supplies and the destruction of hospitals in the Palestinian territory — still not offset by the provision so far of field hospitals — meant care remained inadequate.
“Those two things together mean increased infection rates, increased stays and greater risk of complications. So it is a substandard level of care that you’re able to deliver,” he said.
The MSF president also sounded the alarm over the safety of medical staff in Sudan where at the end of October the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) seized the North Darfur capital of El-Fasher, the army’s last stronghold in the western region.
The paramilitaries’ final advance after a bitter 18-month siege was followed by reports of widespread atrocities.
“One feature that has been consistent, no matter where you are in Sudan, no matter who controls the territory, are attacks on health care and blockages to supply movements and provision of health care,” Abdelmoneim said.
’Freedom, protection access’
The World Health Organization said at the end of October that it had received reports that more than 460 patients and their companions had been shot dead at a maternity hospital in El-Fasher during its capture by the RSF and of six health workers being abducted.
On Thursday, an RSF drone attack on the army-held town of Kalogi in Sudan’s South Kordofan state hit a children’s nursery and a hospital, killing dozens of civilians including children, a local official told AFP.
“Both sides need to allow humanitarian and medical workers freedom, protection and access to the population, and that includes supplies,” said Abdelmoneim, who also worked as a doctor in Omdurman in Sudan in February.
The MSF president said the charity’s medical teams receiving displaced people in Sudan and neighboring Chad were encountering “harrowing tales of sexual violence, tales of ethnically targeted violence, extortion” as well of “evidence that really does point to famine-like conditions.”
In Tawila, a town now sheltering more than 650,000 people fleeing El-Fasher and nearby Zamzam camp, also under RSF control, Abdelmoneim said the MSF had been told by survivors “that family members are detained and never seen again.”
“So our question is, what has happened to that population?” he said.
The medical charity was backing calls by the UN Human Rights Council for an enquiry into the reported violations.
“We would encourage all member states to support that, an independent investigation inside El-Fasher,” Abdelmoneim said.
Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas agreed in October to a US-backed truce deal for Gaza which stipulated an influx of aid to the territory devastated by two years of war and in the grip of a humanitarian crisis.
“It’s as hard as it’s ever been,” Javid Abdelmoneim said of conditions for medical staff operating in Gaza’s hospitals, speaking on the sidelines of the annual Doha Forum on diplomacy on Sunday.
“While we’re able to continue doing operations, deliveries, wound care, you’re using protocols or materials and drugs that are inferior, that are not the standard. So you’ve got substandard care being delivered,” he explained.
Abdelmoneim, who worked as a doctor in Gaza in 2024, said the ongoing truce was only a “ceasefire of sorts” with “still several to dozens of Palestinians being killed every day by Israel.”
Despite the truce, 376 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to local health authorities, as well as three Israeli soldiers.
“We’re seeing the injured patients in the emergency rooms in which we work throughout the strip,” he added.
Aid agencies are pushing for more access for humanitarian convoys to enter Gaza while Israel has resisted calls to allow aid through the Rafah crossing from Egypt.
Aid ‘weaponized’
The MSF president said that since the truce began, aid “hasn’t come in to the level that’s necessary.”
“There isn’t a substantial change and it is being weaponized... So as far as we’re concerned that is an ongoing feature of the genocide. It’s being used as a chip and that’s something that should not happen with humanitarian aid,” Abdelmoneim said.
In 2024, MSF said its medical teams had witnessed evidence on the ground in Gaza and concluded that genocide was taking place.
Israel’s foreign ministry rejected the report saying at the time that it was “fabricated.”
Abdelmoneim said both the lack of supplies and the destruction of hospitals in the Palestinian territory — still not offset by the provision so far of field hospitals — meant care remained inadequate.
“Those two things together mean increased infection rates, increased stays and greater risk of complications. So it is a substandard level of care that you’re able to deliver,” he said.
The MSF president also sounded the alarm over the safety of medical staff in Sudan where at the end of October the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) seized the North Darfur capital of El-Fasher, the army’s last stronghold in the western region.
The paramilitaries’ final advance after a bitter 18-month siege was followed by reports of widespread atrocities.
“One feature that has been consistent, no matter where you are in Sudan, no matter who controls the territory, are attacks on health care and blockages to supply movements and provision of health care,” Abdelmoneim said.
’Freedom, protection access’
The World Health Organization said at the end of October that it had received reports that more than 460 patients and their companions had been shot dead at a maternity hospital in El-Fasher during its capture by the RSF and of six health workers being abducted.
On Thursday, an RSF drone attack on the army-held town of Kalogi in Sudan’s South Kordofan state hit a children’s nursery and a hospital, killing dozens of civilians including children, a local official told AFP.
“Both sides need to allow humanitarian and medical workers freedom, protection and access to the population, and that includes supplies,” said Abdelmoneim, who also worked as a doctor in Omdurman in Sudan in February.
The MSF president said the charity’s medical teams receiving displaced people in Sudan and neighboring Chad were encountering “harrowing tales of sexual violence, tales of ethnically targeted violence, extortion” as well of “evidence that really does point to famine-like conditions.”
In Tawila, a town now sheltering more than 650,000 people fleeing El-Fasher and nearby Zamzam camp, also under RSF control, Abdelmoneim said the MSF had been told by survivors “that family members are detained and never seen again.”
“So our question is, what has happened to that population?” he said.
The medical charity was backing calls by the UN Human Rights Council for an enquiry into the reported violations.
“We would encourage all member states to support that, an independent investigation inside El-Fasher,” Abdelmoneim said.
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